


Decorate My Heart

by sushishin



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Christmas, Christmas Decorations, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-29
Updated: 2020-11-29
Packaged: 2021-03-10 02:35:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,594
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27766858
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sushishin/pseuds/sushishin
Summary: Arthur has no idea why Merlin could possibly need help putting up Christmas decorations in his tiny flat.(Merlin? Ulterior motives? Never.)
Relationships: Merlin/Arthur Pendragon (Merlin)
Comments: 9
Kudos: 37
Collections: Merlin Holidays 2020





	Decorate My Heart

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Aeris444](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aeris444/gifts).



> Happy holidays, I hope you enjoy this!
> 
> Thanks to [Elkoan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elkoan) for the beta, and thanks to the mods for organising this fest :)

‘I still don’t understand why you need my help,’ said Arthur. He carefully held the box of decorations with one arm, as he tried to balance on one leg to remove his shoes. Merlin stood at the doorstep with a stupidly large grin, and made no move to take the box or otherwise assist in any way. ‘Your place is tiny.’ 

It was also on the third floor. With no lift. 

Arthur had gladly helped Lancelot with his essays, had picked up Elyan from the airport, and had carted a second-hand fridge across town for Gwaine, but there was no other able-bodied friend that Arthur would willingly help _put up Christmas decorations_. 

‘Gee, thanks, Arthur. Prat.’

Though sometimes he wondered _why_. 

Arthur could practically hear the line Merlin would have said next: _sorry I don’t live in a castle above us serfs_ , but the penthouse flat was Uther’s, and Arthur didn’t live there anymore. ‘Anyway. I’m sure you can handle this yourself.’

‘This is more fun, admit it.’ 

Hanging out in Merlin’s tiny little flat all afternoon? There were worse places to be: it was messy, sure, but it was leagues better than the flat Merlin had been sharing with Will. And there was worse company to keep. An understatement if there ever was one, but Arthur was used to ignoring his feelings. Still: ‘You lazy sod.’

Merlin shrugged and opened his arms, still grinning. _Yeah, alright, you got me_. ‘Thanks for these,’ he said, as Arthur finally passed him the box with a shake of the head. He reached in and pulled out a snowflake which was absolutely drenched in gold glitter; it was a minor miracle that not all the decorations were gold by now. ‘Poor little things. You’ve been languishing in Arthur’s storage for years, haven’t you? Don’t worry, I’ll give you the love you deserve.’ He wiped his hand on his shirt. It left a smear of glitter. 

Arthur wrinkled his nose, and almost managed to stop himself from wiping his own hand on his trousers. Unfortunately, Merlin noticed, like he did every time. ‘Afraid to get your hands dirty?’

‘Shut up. What are you on, I helped you move in!’ 

Merlin laughed as he backed up into his living room. He set the box onto the floor, next to two other large boxes that, worryingly, also appeared to be full of Christmas decorations. He then turned and picked up an oblong box that sat on the kitchen counter and tossed it to Arthur. ‘Here, I think we can start with this. I’ll get us some tea.’ 

‘What’s in it, tinsel?’ Nope: it was a Christmas tree. ‘So where’s this going?’ 

‘On the dining table.’ 

‘Really?’ If the tree were set up on the floor it’d definitely be tripped over, it was really quite small, but placing it on the dining table just seemed… odd. 

‘Yeah, then I wouldn’t have to look at your face over Christmas dinner. It’d put me right off, otherwise.’ 

Arthur paused in shaking out the box; some of the fake pine needles had come loose. Warmth spread through his chest. ‘I’m coming here for Christmas?’

Merlin stuck his head out of the kitchen. ‘’Course, Arthur. You have somewhere better to be?’

No, not really; there was nobody else he’d rather spend it with. 

The offer shouldn’t have shocked him; he’d spent last Christmas with Merlin after all, what with Morgana being abroad and Uther being intolerant: as if Arthur being bi was some sort of personal attack. They’d visited Hunith and it had been absolutely lovely, even if it had made Arthur’s heart hurt for the mother he had never had the chance to know. 

It had been the longest amount of time Arthur had spent with Merlin at once. They’d been close mates all through uni, but something had shifted in the last year, and suddenly, Arthur’s whole world pointed Merlin’s direction. It was like finding out about the sun and then noticing the way that everything just lit up in the day.

Similes were not his strong suit. 

Merlin placed the tea on the table, then stood, looking at Arthur. He did this, sometimes, with a sort of infinite patience, as if waiting for Arthur to catch up; he was missing something, but what?

‘Thanks.’ He cleared his throat, then picked up his cup and took a sip. It was perfect, just how he liked it, but unfortunately it did nothing to calm his sudden bout of nerves. ‘So. Er. Why is there a cord coming from the tree?’ 

‘It lights up! I know you’re used to real trees and all, but this looked adorable.’ Arthur had to concede that it was, in its own way, rather cute, as Merlin smoothed down the leaves and rearranged the branches. 

Merlin flicked the switch on. Coloured lights twinkled weakly on the tips of some of the leaves. ‘Well. That’s disappointing.’ 

‘It’ll look better in the dark,’ said Arthur doubtfully, as the tree twinkled various shades of white and green and orange. Somehow, the colours combined to an utterly horrid shade of sickly yellow. 

‘I now understand why it was on sale before Christmas,’ said Merlin. He dived back into one of the boxes of decorations. ‘Good thing I bought these little guys!’ He brandished another packet, which contained shiny red baubles, each about the size of a large grape. ‘Right, Arthur, you start on the back. Nothing worse than seeing a naked tree from behind,’ he said, completely seriously, as he nudged Arthur to the other side of the table. 

Thankfully each of the baubles was the exact same shade of red, lest Merlin start on about making sure that the colours were spaced out properly. When he’d helped put up Hunith’s tree, he hadn’t heard the end of it when he’d put two blue decorations - one was a bauble, the other a star, they were different shades of blue anyway, it was _fine_ \- on the same branch. 

Stringing the baubles on the tree was unexpectedly fiddly. The strings were a tad too small for Arthur’s fingers, and somehow they kept sliding off; the branches squeaked as Arthur tried to angle them upwards to hold the baubles better. He flattened some of the needles and reached down to the box without looking.

His fingers brushed Merlin’s as they both reached for the same bauble. 

It sent a shiver up his arm, which was _so stupid_ , but at the same time, completely thrilling. He had a strong instinct to duck and hide his burning face behind the tree, but managed to refrain because the thing was just not tall enough. 

Merlin, for some unknown reason, started humming as he grabbed the bauble and continued to place it on the tree. It took a moment for Arthur to recognise the irritating little earworm of a song: _simply having a wonderful Christmastime…_

After that, putting baubles on the tree was just damn near impossible. 

‘Gee, aren’t you a slow one.’ Merlin had already completed the front of the tree, and was now reaching the edge of Arthur’s area. ‘You know what, get the tinsel, I’ll finish up.’

Arthur grumbled as he struggled to extricate the tinsel from the box. ‘Not my fault you’ve got more dexterous fingers.’ 

Wait. What on earth had possessed him to say that? He hadn’t noticed Merlin’s fingers at all, _ever_ , so clearly he had not said such a thing. Obviously. He turned back to hand over the tinsel. 

‘It could be,’ said Merlin, with a wink, and _what._

‘That doesn’t even make any sense.’ Arthur had clearly knocked his head at some point today. Maybe coming up the stairs. 

‘Don’t worry about it,’ said Merlin, as he wound the tinsel around the tree.

‘Right.’

*

The thing was, Arthur had no plans of ever doing anything about it. 

Arthur wasn’t a coward, but there were just some things in life that were more precious than anything, and one of those things was his friendship with Merlin. If he said something, and Merlin didn’t feel the same way? They’d be friends, still, but it’d be awkward, and that would be just unbearable. 

So instead, they did this thing, where they spent most of their free time together, and Arthur didn’t date, and Merlin didn’t date, and Arthur tried to puzzle out what this thing was, exactly. 

Merlin rummaged through one of the larger boxes, then turned, a tangle of fairy lights in his hands. ‘I reckon we can tackle these next,’ he said. ‘I think they’re gonna look great on the ceiling.’ 

‘The ceiling.’ Arthur’s eyebrows were about there now. 

‘I put up these hooks,’ and when Arthur looked up, there they were, up near the ceiling, a row of six removable plastic hooks. Merlin gestured to the opposite wall, where there was a matching row of hooks. ‘We can string the lights between them, so the ceiling will look like stars. But rainbow. Rainbow stars.’ 

It was a solid idea, undermined by the fact that Merlin did not own a stepladder, or a stool, or a chair that didn’t have a wonky leg. Arthur held the chair steady while Merlin clambered onto it and looped a section of the lights around one of the hooks. 

‘Okay, now we do the other side.’

They repeated this, over and over, as they zig-zagged the fairy lights across Merlin’s ceiling. They were at the last hook, Arthur’s eyes carefully averted, when - _Merlin must have put up these hooks earlier by himself._ Did he even need Arthur here? He didn’t need Arthur’s baubles, either, as he seemed to have enough to cover a flat three times the size of this one. So - not that Arthur ever needed any particular reason to see Merlin, but - _why was he here?_

‘Ta - da!’

Merlin had plugged in the lights and turned them on. It was a surprisingly good effect, the lights flickering in a multitude of colours, making the room feel even more cosy. Merlin had his hands on his hips as he gazed up at the ceiling. 

‘Looks good so far,’ he said, ‘Now we can put the other bits up.’ He pulled out a bauble from Arthur’s box. He then produced a bag of small S hooks. ‘We can hang these off the lights.’

‘You already have fairy lights,’ said Arthur. ‘Think about it, you nutter. You don’t need to do this.’

‘Well they won’t fit on the tree,’ said Merlin. True enough, ten of them would probably cover it. ‘I’d hate to put them to waste.’

Then he climbed back on the chair, and hooked the bauble off the lights. ‘See? It looks great!’ Arthur scrambled to steady the chair again; no matter if Merlin had put up the hooks earlier on his own, he wasn’t about to let Merlin get injured on his watch. 

‘It definitely looks… festive.’ It was not exactly ugly, with the silver bauble reflecting the colours of the lights, but it really was just too much. ‘Merlin, it’s like, completely naff.’

‘It’s going to be fantastic,’ said Merlin. ‘Okay. Pass the silver snowflake.’

‘Merlin. Please don’t.’

‘Arthur. Don’t question my genius,’ said Merlin. ‘C’mon, pass the silver snowflake.’

‘Your _genius_?’ he scoffed, but, well, there really was no stopping him. ‘Silver sparkly snowflake, this other silvery sparkly snowflake, or silver reflective snowflake?’

‘The second one. Okay. Now the dog in the Santa hat…’ 

It didn’t take as long as Arthur predicted, mostly because thankfully, they couldn’t hang that many ornaments on the lights lest it got too heavy. Finally, Arthur sat on the sofa with a new cup of tea, as Merlin paced the short distance between his kitchen and the dining table, looking up all the while. 

‘Guess it’s all sorted now, then?’ It didn’t look like there was anymore that could be done, but then again, this was Merlin, and they had just spent the last half hour hanging ornaments off fairy lights.

Merlin shook his head, brow furrowed. ‘It’s just missing… something.’

The ceiling twinkled in a rainbow of colours. If Merlin were an inch taller, he’d be hitting his head on a purple reindeer. ‘How can you possibly say that?’

‘Shhh,’ said Merlin. ‘You’re ruining the holiday spirit.’ 

‘I don’t think I possibly can,’ said Arthur. ‘Not with all the holiday spirit on the ceiling.’

Merlin paced some more, then stopped abruptly. ‘Tinsel!’

‘ _Where?_ ’ 

Merlin knelt next to a box and started pulling out what looked like an infinite supply of tinsel. ‘Everywhere.’

He stood, looked around, and then wrapped some pink tinsel around a dining chair. ‘See?’

‘I see. You want to live in a cave of tinsel.’ 

‘Exactly.’ 

Ridiculous man. 

Arthur loved him.

*

‘Almost done,’ said Merlin. 

‘How is _this_ ,’ Arthur gestured at the flat, which was covered in truly excessive amounts of tinsel, ‘Not done yet?’ 

‘Finishing touches,’ said Merlin. He pulled out a fluffy red bird wearing a little Santa hat. ‘Will got this for me as a housewarming present!’ He fiddled with the battery cover. ‘Oh, he’s the best, he put batteries in already!’

‘ _Jingle Bird: Clap and the Jingle Bird will sing,_ ’ Arthur read from the back of the box. ‘I thought housewarming presents were supposed to be _useful_.’ 

‘And this isn’t?’ Merlin flicked the switch on the base, and settled the bird on his kitchen counter, one of the few non-tinsel-covered areas of the flat.

‘Tea towels, or the like,’ said Arthur. 

‘I already have those, though. You gave them to me.’ 

Merlin's had been wearing thin, and they were very nice towels: soft, absorbent, and didn’t leave little bits of fluff everywhere. His gift was definitely more useful than some singing toy bird. 

‘Alright then,’ said Merlin. He almost looked manic as he brought his hands together for a loud clap _._ The bird gave a chirp, _wiggled its butt_ , and began to tweet the tune of ‘We Wish You a Merry Christmas’. 

‘It dances,’ said Arthur.

‘It’s glorious,’ said Merlin, almost reverently.

When he smiled like that… it would be difficult, later, to walk out of this apartment, as claustrophobically Christmassy as it was. Arthur could only hope that one day, before Merlin was undoubtedly snapped up by some other guy Arthur already hated, he’d have the guts to confess it all: that seeing Merlin was the best part of his day, even if they were just catching the tube together; that his jokes were awful but somehow hilarious; and that Arthur loved him, _so damn much._

The song finished with a high pitched _chirp chirp chirp_ , and immediately, Merlin clapped his hands again. ‘You’re an idiot, Merlin.’ 

‘Nah,’ said Merlin quietly. His eyes met Arthur’s. ‘I don’t think so.’ 

And almost before Arthur had registered him moving, Merlin kissed him. 

The world blurred out for a long, exquisite second; and for a moment, nothing else existed except Merlin. _What was happening?_

‘Okay?’ Merlin’s hands were on his shoulders, and his look was earnest. ‘Arthur?’

‘Um.’ His heart thudded in his chest, his lips tingled, and putting together a coherent sentence felt _absolutely beyond_ his capabilities at the moment. He opened his mouth. ‘Your lips are really soft.’ 

‘Thanks, I think,’ said Merlin. ‘You alright?’

‘Yeah.’ Slowly, he leaned forward, and brushed his lips against Merlin’s. ‘Better than. Wow.’ He raised his hands to wrap around Merlin’s waist. ‘So. Can we… do that some more?’ 

‘Yes, you _idiot_ ,’ Merlin laughed. 

Then he cradled the back of Arthur’s head, fingers curled in his hair, and kissed him again, and again, and again.

**Author's Note:**

> Merlin’s decorations are inspired by my parents: they put fairy lights up, then hang baubles off them! Thankfully they don’t cover everything in tinsel as well. My dad likes to hang the Jingle Bird above the bathroom door, so the sound of the door closing activates it. If you want to know what it sounds likes, someone’s uploaded a video to [YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RzVMygO2x6E). 
> 
> Title is from ‘Glittery’ by Kacey Musgraves.


End file.
